


Evil May Triumph When Good Angels Do Nothing

by AstroGirl



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen, The Black Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-10
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2021-01-26 19:21:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21379234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AstroGirl/pseuds/AstroGirl
Summary: Heaven believes these things should happen without interference.  Heaven isn't there watching a child die of the Black Death, though.  Aziraphale is.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 44
Collections: Hurt/Comfort Bingo - Round 10





	Evil May Triumph When Good Angels Do Nothing

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for Hurt/Comfort Bingo, for the prompt "forced to participate in illegal / hurtful activity." Although in this case, it's less "forced to participate" and more "forced to let it happen."
> 
> Content warning for child suffering and some mildly gross descriptions of an extremely horrible disease.

On the bed of damp, vermin-infested straw, the boy sweats and whimpers. The life is fading from him. Aziraphale can feel it. Even when his eyes are open, he no longer seems to see the room he's in, his gaze fixed instead on something else, something personal and distant. Aziraphale hopes it's something nice. Something better. Although it would be difficult to imagine it being worse. 

The boy shivers and shudders. 

Aziraphale does nothing.

No. No, that is not entirely true. Aziraphale presses a cool, wet cloth to his forehead. He tilts the boy's face downward when he vomits up blood, and cleans the foul, black matter from the dirt floor, after. He holds the boy's hand. He speaks to him: inane, useless words in a soothing tone he most likely can no longer properly understand.

He does all these things. What he doesn't do is the only thing that could genuinely help.

Aziraphale does no miracles. And slowly, moment by moment, the child dies.

**

Aziraphale doesn't hear the demon come in, but he can sense him. That old, familiar presence. He's not sure why the feeling should suddenly make him want to weep. Foolish, to experience that impulse now, when he's been controlling it for so long.

"Thought I felt you lurking round here," Crowley says behind him. "Doing a bit of healing, eh? I must say, you've left it blessed late this time." Crowley's voice is light, but Aziraphale can hear the note of genuine accusation in it. 

For a long moment, he says nothing. In the bed, a small, ragged sigh escapes the child's lips.

"No," he says, finally.

"Eh?" Crowley comes forward and peers at the child in the bed. He looks confused. "You certainly have for this one. Look at the state of him." 

He has been. He's been looking at it for days. "I'm not..." He has to stop for a moment. His throat doesn't seem entirely willing to cooperate. He tries again. "I'm not healing him. I'm not healing anyone. I've been forbidden from doing miracles for them."

The look on Crowley's face seems to be asking him if this is some sort of horrible, tasteless joke. "What," says the demon. "That's... _What?_"

"I've been told..." Aziraphale clears his throat. His hand clasps the boy's more tightly. Yesterday, he was still sometimes able to clasp back. Today the hand is limp. "I've been told it's better not to interfere. That this..." He looks away from the child's face, casts his eyes for a moment to the floor. "...is a sort of, a sort of test. Of their faith, you see. And that suffering is meant to bring people closer to God."

He can't see Crowley's eyes behind the smoked glass that covers them. It's probably just as well. The disgust on the parts of his face Aziraphale _can_ see is bad enough. It makes something sick and terrible twist inside his stomach. It feels like shame. Why should he be ashamed of doing his duty? 

Why should his duty be shameful?

"Take it from me," says Crowley, his voice a harsh, whispering hiss, "suffering does no such thing."

"Well, of course it's not the same for you. You're a demon. Humans are different."

The child coughs. Aziraphale wipes a trace of blood from his lips with a cloth that once was white. Crowley makes a disdainful sound.

"It isn't mine to question," Aziraphale says, his own voice not much above a whisper, and closes his eyes for a moment. 

"Who is he, anyway?" asks Crowley. "That you'd sit here with him like this if you're not allowed to miracle him better?

"No one. He's no one. I don't even know his name." Aziraphale wipes the child's brow. "But he just collapsed, right in front of me. What else was I to do? The rest of his family were already dead."

Crowley lets out another sound. Not a sigh, not a groan, but some frustrated combination of the two. He steps forward and elbows Aziraphale aside.

"Crowley! What are you--?"

"Shut up, angel," Crowley hisses. He lays a hand on the child's shoulder, above the swollen buboes that cluster in the pit of his arm. 

The buboes reduce, recede, retreat back into the boy's flesh. The gangrenous black of his bare toes pales back into pink, healthy skin. Sweat dries on his forehead. His breathing slows, calms, evens out into that of a deep and natural sleep.

"_Crowley_," Aziraphale whispers. "Thank y--"

"Don't. _Don't_. I'm thwarting the will of Heaven, aren't I?" He turns to Aziraphale. Behind the glass, Aziraphale catches a glimpse of glittering yellow. "_Aren't I?_"

"Yes," says Aziraphale, a little shakily. Then, more strongly, "Yes. It's a great pity that all this holding myself back has taken such a toll on me. Not at all at the top of my own thwarting game, I'm afraid. Probably don't have it in me to stop you."

"Good," says Crowley. He looks again at the boy in the bed. Even healthy, he seems so very weak. So terribly small. "_Kids,"_ says Crowley, disgust dripping from his voice. "What _is_ it with Heaven and kids?"

"I don't know," says Aziraphale. "It's--"

"Don't. _Don't_ say it."

Aziraphale doesn't. Instead, he lays a hand on Crowley's arm. 

For a moment, Crowley lets him. The feeling of it is more comforting than it should be. A great deal more.

"Right, well," says the demon. "Guess I'm off, then."

"Oh?" says Aziraphale. Is it wrong, this flicker of hope that's burning inside his chest? Is it treasonous? Right now, he isn't at all certain that he _cares_. It's a terrifying thought. "Where to, then?"

"Well," says the demon. "Got a lot of thwarting to do, don't I? I don't know if you've noticed, angel, but there are a _lot_ of people in this village getting closer to God." 

The way those last words twist and turn to acid on the Serpent's tongue ought to sound like blasphemy. But Aziraphale doesn't care. He absolutely doesn't care. "Perhaps I will see you later, then," he says, as delicately as he can. "When I'm sufficiently recovered."

Crowley waves a dismissive hand. "The way this century's going, I think that's gonna take a while. See you around, angel."

And with that, he's gone.

Aziraphale looks down at the boy, at his peaceful, sleeping face. 

He doesn't look any further from God.

Aziraphale takes the child's hand again, and smiles.


End file.
